clussy: ÉĒᴄᴏɴ ʙʏ ÉĒᴄᴏɴsꜰᴏʀʙÉĒᴛᴄʜᴇs (ᴛᴜᴍʙʟʀ) (𝚍𝚎𝚊𝚛 𝚐𝚘𝚍)
eddie kaspbrak ([personal profile] clussy) wrote in [community profile] thisavrou2017-11-04 12:47 am

video 01 | Aortic Aneurysm

(You know who is not going to react to this situation decently no matter how many times it's explained to him? Eddie. You know who doesn't have a good game face against fear? Also Eddie. He's alone, he needs an adult, and he's pretty sure they don't restock on inhalers here. He knew he didn't need it, not technically, but he also knew that his lungs were contracting at a rate that lead to hyperventilating and as far as he was concerned, that was exactly what an asthma attack was all about. He was having an asthma attack. Maybe. His body was thinking about it.

By the way, he's definitely just been staring at the video for a couple of silent seconds, his jaw working back and forth as he just tried to remind himself that he was actually capable of breathing. This kid......)


My mom's going to fucking kill me.

(The words are whispered under his breath and he would think twice about swearing if he realized how many adults might be watching this video. He was enough of a loser that he could get the whole communication device thing, really, that was fine. But he wasn't quite able to wrap his mind around the full extent of it all.

After a second, he decides fuck it. He needs his inhaler. It goes up, he gives it a few shakes, and takes a deep, deep breath in with it. Holds. Holds.

Then his whole body deflates, his eyes rolling up. He closes his eyes and thinks about how he would talk to the police in Derry. Ha. If that wasn't the biggest fucking joke ever. When he speaks next, his voice is pitched higher than before, that typical 'I'm trying super hard to be polite and endearing' voice that he uses to call his mom 'mommy' when he's real apologetic. He's not even trying to be a suck up. The kid's just scared.)


Um. My name's Eddie Kaspbrak. I'm Sonia Kaspbrak's son and I definitely need to be home for dinner which is like, in an hour. So if anyone can help...I would really appreciate it.

.....God, I really hope this isn't that creep who was taking all those kids.
skelepun: (2450096 (2))

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 04:11 am (UTC)(link)
[It's a companionable set up, the smell of old greasy mingling with the oddly pleasant smell of plant life on its last legs. Sans had never seen a true autumn, but if he had he might be reminded of it too.

But even without the first hand experience, there was something nostalgic about it. That funny spot between life and death -- and whaddya know, limbo had french fries.]


Me? Nah. I mean, I am a person, but I was never human. [He winks, leaning over to steal one of Eddie's fries with a quick finger to his "lips."] I was a kid like you, once. A lot smaller, though. N' nope.

[Another fry stolen.]

Never learned how to ride a bike.
skelepun: (2450096 (31))

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 05:38 am (UTC)(link)
A lot smaller. [He holds up his latest stolen fry as an example, though his straight face could use some work.] N' hey, you think you're up for that kinda challenge? Coordination isn't my strong suit.

[He bites the "head" off the fry he's holding.]

Would I lose cool points if I told you I'm a real speed demon on a tricycle?
skelepun: (2450096 (13))

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 06:13 am (UTC)(link)
[It's a treat just to listen to him, honestly. Half eaten fry momentarily forgotten, Sans leans back against the grass with a metaphorical sigh. His ribs expand and contract, simulating the slow motion of breathing.

It's relaxing, in a strange way, listening to a kid talk like this. All of it is, despite the looming shoe hanging over them, inching close and closer to falling.]


Your friends, right? You mentioned them before. What're they like?
skelepun: (2470718 (10))

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 07:30 am (UTC)(link)
[Shriek-y, rambly, and over the top? That was just his normal. The coolest guy he ever knew was all those things and more, after all.

Plenty of people back home didn't find him very cool, either. But Sans always did. Always would, too. Maybe that's why the scene felt familiar in a strange, bittersweet sort of way. It'd been a long time since his little brother was young enough to talk so openly with him about his hopes and fears. It was nostalgic.

Of course, Papyrus never would've sworn quite so much. Not to mention the fact that Eddie was still alive, for the time being.

But details were cheap.]


Uh huh. [Sans nods along, listening closer than he might appear to be. Occasionally he punctuates the story with a soft mm or nod of the skull, taking mental notes on each new wrinkle and twist Eddie's words took.

Ben, new kid, smart, big. Mike, negro (whatever that was), farmer. Bill, a leader with a missing little brother, Eddie's favorite.

Richie, annoying, a jerk, Eddie's other favorite.

Call it a talent for reading people, call it the obvious earmarks of a kid with a crush, but Sans didn't have to stretch too hard to hit that conclusion.]


I dunno what you mean about you not hanging out with cool people, your little crew sounds pretty rad. I mean, flooding a town? [He nudges Eddie gently.] Not bad.
Edited 2017-11-05 07:35 (UTC)
skelepun: (pic#10074933)

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 05:12 pm (UTC)(link)
[When Eddie grins on the tail end of losers, it might as well be accompanied by a burst of sunlight. Not a comparison made lightly (ha) by a man who spent the majority of his life underground, only hearing about the sun in books and stories told by those old enough to have seen it with their own eyes.

It was a special thing. This kid had spark in him. Weighed down, maybe, but too bright to miss its shine.

... This place was gonna tear him to pieces.]


Skeletons? Oh, sure. I'm a pretty popular guy back where I'm from. [In so far as popularity could be measured by how many people who knew his name and his drink order, but nothing else.] Here? Eh... I'm eating french fries with a new pal now, aren't I?

[He winks, and steals another fry. They were down to the dregs now; only bits left. Those were Eddie's spoils of victory, and Sans avoids them in favor of a shriveled up frankenfry.]

S'alright if I ask you something a little more serious, kid?
Edited 2017-11-05 17:13 (UTC)
skelepun: ([sans] 70)

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 06:52 pm (UTC)(link)
Yeah, some of 'em are. Skeletons and ghosts and bunnies and dogs. [Two are perhaps not like the other, but Snowdin was a pretty cool place that way. Literally.] And lemme tell you, nobody cheats at poker like a dog.

But I've got some human friends, too.

[It's impressive, honestly, how quick Eddie is on the uptake. For all his initial surprise, the mundanity of Sans' appearance and species settled in quickly over their interactions. There was no laundry list of questions about the hows and whys of his existence, no suspicion, no prolonged horror.

Just a kid, eating fries, asking about his monster friends.

... A kid, eating fries, making sure someone like him got enough to eat even in a strange place where he knew nothing and no one.

Sans takes a crispy fry end. He doesn't buy that this kid was stuffed off a few stale french fries, but far be it from him to turn the kid down.]


Like you. [He nudges Eddie's shoulder, hand hovering over it with a quick, steadying squeeze.] Of course we're friends.

So that's why I'm gonna ask... how much did everybody tell you so far, about this place?
Edited 2017-11-05 18:55 (UTC)
skelepun: (im tired)

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 08:02 pm (UTC)(link)
Hah, no kidding! They're terrible at it. It's not the faces you gotta watch, though. [He leans down, as if passing on a secret.] It's the tails.

[Not that Sans complained when he was taking all their money. Maybe now Eddie could take some people's money, too.

Well, dog money, anyway.]


But it sounds like you got the lowdown. That's good. [It was.] How's it all... y'know, sinking in? You feeling alright?
Edited 2017-11-05 20:02 (UTC)
skelepun: (2470718 (3))

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 08:36 pm (UTC)(link)
[Eddie would have no cognizance of his past, of the things he'd done and said and not said. He couldn't have known, and yet Sans couldn't help feeling a twinge of something at the back of his skull at the surprise in Eddie's body language. All over being asked something so simple.

It wasn't righting any past wrongs -- nothing could do that, Sans had seen that with his own eye sockets -- but there was a strange sort of mercy in those three little words.

Are you okay?

If only he'd learned that a long time ago. Maybe things would've been different.]


Yeah, of course.

[The rambling list of fears, the worries, the talk of his mother (maybe not high-five worthy, after all...), all of it could wait for the moment.

Whatever it was this kid had to get off his chest, that was where Sans' eyelights focused now. He scoots a bit closer in the grass, skull ducked lower. Conspiratory. Safe.]


What's up?
Edited 2017-11-05 20:45 (UTC)
skelepun: ([sans] 52)

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 09:59 pm (UTC)(link)
[It's not a happy secret.]

[From their small bubble -- private only by the grace of some unspoken, tenuous promise with the rest of the world -- Sans' eye sockets soften slightly. From this close vantage, Eddie's body language was easy to see and even easier to read.

The fears of children were sometimes just that -- childish. Fear of punishment, fear of reprisal, fear of the unknown. But sometimes, there was something deeper about those anxieties. Something that settled past the what ifs into concrete certainty.

When Eddie says she'd lock me away, it wasn't a trembling kid anxious over missing dinner. It was the assertion of a child who knew his mother, and knew how she might react.

She wasn't the first mother Sans had ever heard of, who wished desperately for her children to be protected even at the limits of their freedoms. He could remember as clear as day, one such mother reaching out to him through a locked door, imploring him to protect any children who walked through it.

But unlike Eddie's mother, children did walk through that door.

She did let them go.

Whoever this woman was, things were different. Wrong, somehow.]


Hey. [Sans begins, choosing his words carefully.] That's... you don't have to be ashamed of that, kid. Sometimes... sometimes, it's easier, not having to worry about yourself and someone else.

[His perpetual grin tightens a little.]

Your mom sounds like she gives you kinda a lot to worry about, huh?
Edited 2017-11-05 22:00 (UTC)
skelepun: (2470718 (2))

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 11:20 pm (UTC)(link)
[It was a lot of information. That the inhaler wasn't necessary, that the inhaler was fake, the extent of his mother's domineering rules. A relationship now ticked far past overprotective and into a network of constraints. Rules with no purposes, limits without reason.

That Eddie seemed aware of that only made it worse, somehow. Buying into the lies people tell at least provided a sense of comfort and consistency to backwards logic. Poor kid didn't even have that.

Sick in the head.

He starts to speak several times, only to stop before any words could escape. Finally,
he straightens up, looking back over the greenery's expanse. Wilted, sure, but still beautiful.

How many things would Eddie's mother be terrified of here, he wondered. The pollen? The alien plants?

... The monster talking to her son?

There as a lot to unpack. Too much for him to fix with mere words of encouragement or sympathy. And for a moment, Sans is at a loss of how to help.

(you're not good at this, call Shepard, call someone who has the barest idea of how to not screw this up)

And then, it comes to him.]


Hey, kid. [He finally speaks, almost suddenly, turning back to Eddie.] You wanna know something cool?
skelepun: (2450096 (33))

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 11:29 pm (UTC)(link)
I'll show you.

[He gets up, brushing some grass off his shorts before offering a hand down to Eddie.]

We're going on a field trip, kiddo.

[There's a beat of pause as Sans remembers their conversation from before. Strangers versus friends.]

Y'know, if that's cool with you.
skelepun: (2470718 (1))

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-05 11:45 pm (UTC)(link)
[As sanitary as most things on a dirty abandoned space station. Possibly less, if only because the crew was making a conscious effort to tidy the Avagi, whereas Sans hadn't seen the inside of a shower for a couple weeks now.

It hadn't been his best month. But as the kid's hand tightens around his, Sans can't help the distant sense that things were looking up just a little.]


Huh? [The offer is a surprise, but one Sans responds to with a broadening of his usual grin. This kid was something else, and whatever that something was had already started to grow on him.] Hell yeah, kiddo. You're never gonna see me turn down a free ride.

[He puts one slippered foot on the pegs, nodding for Eddie to hop on.]

Head back down the greenery path, out into the main hall, and turn left. I'll tell you the rest once we get rolling.
skelepun: ([sans] 44)

[personal profile] skelepun 2017-11-06 01:21 am (UTC)(link)
[It had been a while since Sans last bothered taking in a scenic route somewhere. If his initial tour of the station wasn't still relatively recent, they might've never found their way at all.

Of course, that didn't stop Sans from pointing out a few wrong turns. Chalk it up to him enjoying the ride. And the laugh he'd occasionally laugh he'd squeeze out of the kid playing dumb. It's the little things.

Two right turns, three left turns, and four wrong turns later the pair found themselves stopped in front of a large, decorative set of double doors. Observation Deck was written above it, designating the location's name and purpose all together.]


Alright, this is it.

[Hopping off, Sans reaches into his pocket. Whatever it is his hand winds around, he doesn't pull it out just yet.]

There's just one thing we gotta take care of first.

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